Talk:Mildred and Richard Loving

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 26 January 2021 and 7 May 2021. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Rena225.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 04:07, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Article title

I have edited Mildred and Richard Loving and Richard Loving to redirect to here, instead of Loving v Virginia. However, it seems to me that it might be better to title this article Mildred and Richard Loving, with a redirect from here to there instead. The change would only require a slight rewording of the opening, as near as I can tell. I don't know how to change a page title, though.--Ramsey2006 (talk) 17:17, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

It's an interesting idea, having a biographical article about two people at the same time. Are there other examples you can point me to? All the famous couples who did their work together that I can think of each have individual articles. It seems to be the encyclopedia standard. Furthermore, Mildred is the one who filed the case, so far as I can see. She went on to make statements in 2007 that her husband, dead least last 30 years, had no part of. I believe she is an historical figure and symbol both with her husband and on her own, and deserves her own page. Netmouse (talk) 17:46, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

if he wasn't party to the case, why is the first citation I foumd with a search "RICHARD PERRY LOVING et ux., Appellants, v. VIRGINIA 388 US 1, 18 L ed 2d 1010, 87 S Ct 1817, Argued April 10, 1967. Decided June 12, 1967."?? My guess is the fact that only Mildred has available for interviews for the past three decades has created the impression that she was the only one who cared about the matter. I find a number of references to a Life magazine article that quote him, and another to an Ebony article, and comments suggesting his wife didn't like giving interviews. I wonder if he had lived longer he wouldn't be the one best known as the one speaking for the Lovings. If someone dies before the internet, do they matter to history as recorded on the net? Mulp (talk) 00:44, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

and to give a very specific example, I point to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosenbergs Mulp (talk) 03:16, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

that's a good example. And I should have said Mildred initiated the follow-up, because they were both defendants in the legal case but from what I've seen she wrote to the attorney general about it. I certainly don't mean to demean Richard's role in things, though I would expect having the man's name lead the legal case ledger was (and still is to an extent) simply standard practice. We can wonder what Richard might have said had he lived, but the history that actually exists is that she lived and became a noted historic figure later in her life. We shouldn't not document that just because it is an artifact of the short memory of society. It's true that I couldn't think of a really good category for her though, because African-American rights activist suggests she was more political than she was. Netmouse (talk) 16:25, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

It doesn't really matter to me one way or the other. All three wikipedia pages now point here. As long as is is aparently not inconsistent with wikipedia practice, given the Rosenburgs article, I really can't imagine a circumstance where any of the three articles gets split off from the other two, since they would all be likely to contain exactly the same information, anyway. --Ramsey2006 (talk) 02:11, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

Re: taking out the "Matriarch of mixed marriages" quote, it has been used in multiple headlines, from different sources, so there certainly is no lie in saying that she has been called that. I believe the text of one article also referred to her that way. Now the article is missing a clear lead-in that states why it is of historical/general interest. I'm not one to get into an "undo" revision war with someone, but I disagree with your decision, there, Ramsey2006. Netmouse (talk) 17:46, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

The phrase did certainly appear in quite alot of headlines, but as near as I could tell from a google search at the time, they all seemed to stem from a single AP story after her death. I would certainly be interested in seeing even a single use of the phrase prior to her death. I've seen several stories about the Lovings over the years, and I can't recall a phrase even resembling that one ever being used while she was alive. It may very well be that going in to the future the decision of one AP editor may result in the phrase becoming unalterably and routinely associated with her, but I think that we should wait until that happens. Multiple news outlets running with the same AP headline on the same AP story on the same day does not to me qualify as a reason to use it in the opening sentence of this article. It does, however, make it quite difficult to find any other prior uses of the phrase using google should they exist, unfortunately. --Ramsey2006 (talk) 01:58, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

I just wanted to add that I believe this article should be titled Mildred and Richard Loving, not Mildred Loving. While she did live longer, and got more media coverage than him because of it, they are notable only as a couple. Mildred herself said she was not a political person, and I doubt either of them would ever have been notable if it hadn't been for Loving v. Virginia (a twist of fate, one might say). I'm not going to change it, just throwing in my $.02. 76.103.213.78 (talk) 00:03, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Maybe I'll do it myself, if I can find some instructions about how to move pages around here somewhere. The move really does make sense, and the way that it is set up now is a bit of an anomoly. I do know that we can't just copy the article to the Mildred and Richard Loving page because we would lose the history. Anybody want to take bets on whether or not I manage to delete the entire article in the process of trying to move it? I don't think that there is anything that I could really do that would cause any irreversible damage. I don't think... --Ramsey2006 (talk) 00:56, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Well, I couldn't do it. I think that it is because the page already exists and has an edit history. (Originally it redirected to Loving v. Virginia and later I edited it to redirect here. So it will take an administrator to actually perform the move. I'll put in a request.--Ramsey2006 (talk) 01:14, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Slow down a bit. It's not hard to move a page (the button to do so is right at the top of every article), but I do not think it is a good idea, nor does there seem to be clear consensus for it. IMO, since Mildred lived much longer than Richard, and made a variety of statements subsequent to his death, her notability is greater than his. On those grounds, the current title should be the one we keep as the main article (with redirects getting to here). Convince me that the move is a good thing before doing it (I'm not doctrinaire against it, just not convinced it's for the better), since I wasn't here for the discussion last May. LotLE×talk 01:18, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

I am in the process of setting up a section for discussion of the potential move below, under the name Requested move, since that is the title suggested by wikipedia, and in any case this section has been about multiple issues. The actual move cannot be made immediately by somebody without administrative powers anyway, because of the edit history of the would-be new article title.--Ramsey2006 (talk) 01:33, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

Photo Needed

While it is a good start, this article could really use a photograph. No doubt it had one at some point only to be removed by the "freedom" extremists. I suggest, now that she is dead, that a case can be made for a fair-use image. --Dragon695 (talk) 21:19, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

I added a photo. --Ramsey2006 (talk) —Preceding comment was added at 01:31, 26 May 2008 (UTC)

The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the proposal was consensus to move.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 02:03, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

Requested Move

I am requesting that this article be moved from Mildred Loving to Mildred and Richard Loving. This section is for the discussion of the merits (or lack thereof) of this move. --Ramsey2006 (talk) 01:36, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

This article is really about both of them. Their notability in wikipedia is directly and solely tied to their being a married couple in a significant and historic US Supreme Court ruling reguarding marriage rights. There is no significant chance of either Mildred or Richard ever having their own articles separate from their joint article. As near as I can tell, no editing (or very minor copy editing) of the actual article would be required for the title change, as the article in reality is already about both of them. --Ramsey2006 (talk) 01:45, 10 August 2008 (UTC)

• Move - It seems the main reason Mildred's name is more prominent is that she outlived her husband by thirty years, and was able to give more recent interviews. But, it was their marriage and its legal consequences that are notable. zadignose (talk) 09:33, 10 August 2008 (UTC)
• Comment. I am moderately convinced by Ramsey2006's argument. And also by the analogy of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg (though I'm not sure I would have supported that organization of the Rosenbergs if it was a new issue). However, I see Zadignose's point as arguing in the opposite direction as him/her. The fact is that Mildred did live much longer, and thereby have the opportunity to make various statements after Richard's death (some reported in the article); if they had both died so early, I think the argument for the conjoined article would be much stronger. If Richard had lived longer... well, who knows what he might have done or said subsequently. LotLE×talk 16:23, 10 August 2008 (UTC)
• Move and turn both names into proper re-directs. It was their marriage and its legal consequences that are notable. I'm also betting that 'Loving versus Virginia' means the 'Loving couple' versus Virginia. And the legal case is what truly matters (throught the case the Supreme court changed the law of the Virginia). Flamarande (talk) 16:32, 10 August 2008 (UTC)
  • Full title of the case is "Loving et ux. v Virginia, so Flamarande collects. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 21:30, 10 August 2008 (UTC)
• Move, as proposer. "Longevity has its place." (MLK) It is certainly true that Mildred made (very!) occaisional public statements after Richard's death, although she seems to have shunned publicity to a great extent (and aparently "imposed" silence on her adult children as well). Quite notable was her last statement reguarding marriage equality made in commemoration of the 40th aniversary of Loving v Virginia (and also quite controversial, if my WP:OR from my being immediately banned from at least one internet discussion board for the mere infraction of posting the statement when she first released it is any indication! LOL!). But, I would argue that the notability of her statement derived from the fact of who it was that said it rather than the other way around. She was not notable because she made the statement (indeed, many people make such statements all the time with hardly anybody noticing at all), rather the statement was notable because it was her who made made it. It seems to me (if Phyl Newbeck's Virginia Hasn't Always Been For Lovers is any indication) that Mildred and Richard were like so many people (both then and today) who are not out to change the world, but rather who simply want to live their own lives in peace, and who become reluctantly thrust into the limelight because others will not allow them to do so without a fight. --Ramsey2006 (talk) 18:23, 10 August 2008 (UTC)
• Move. This article is indeed about both of them; it is not just a biography of Mildred. Croctotheface (talk) 03:15, 11 August 2008 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Image copyright problem with Image:Mildred Jeter and Richard Loving.jpg

The image Image:Mildred Jeter and Richard Loving.jpg is used in this article under a claim of fair use, but it does not have an adequate explanation for why it meets the requirements for such images when used here. In particular, for each page the image is used on, it must have an explanation linking to that page which explains why it needs to be used on that page. Please check

• That there is a non-free use rationale on the image's description page for the use in this article.
• That this article is linked to from the image description page.

This is an automated notice by FairuseBot. For assistance on the image use policy, see Wikipedia:Media copyright questions. --07:15, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

Restoring and name clarification

There is more than enough about the couple to merit an article separate from the court case. Particularly now that there are full-length documentaries about their lives as well as the context of the case.

I don't believe she was ever called Mildred Delores Jeter Loving; she was born M.D.Jeter and later changed her name to M.D.Loving. I've changed the name in the opening sentence accordingly. – SJ + 02:28, 13 June 2020 (UTC)